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Reading passage Grade 2 Social Studies & Civics

Snow on North Hill: Birch Landing's Summer Water

A grade 2 read-aloud passage about a fictional snowy town whose winter drifts melt into the pond it drinks from, with six who, what, and why questions.

Objectives

  1. Students will answer key-detail questions about a passage on a snowy town's water supply.
  2. Students will explain how winter snow becomes a town's summer drinking water.
  3. Students will describe one thing the town asks people to do after a thin winter.

Vocabulary

Key words: snowdrift, melt, pond, pump house, plow

Teacher overview

Weather shaping daily life is easiest to teach where the weather is dramatic, so this read-aloud passage puts a made-up town under deep winter snow and follows that snow into the pond the town drinks from in July. The chain runs in four plain steps a second grader can retell: snow falls, snow piles up, snow melts, the pond fills. The passage closes with what the town asks of people after a winter that brought little snow, which gives the conservation idea a cause students can point to.

Snow on North Hill: Birch Landing's Summer Water — Grade 2 Social Studies & Civics
Name: ____________________________ Date: ______________

Passage

Snow on North Hill

Birch Landing is a made-up town in a cold place. Winter there is long.

Snow falls for weeks. It piles up on North Hill above the town. The drifts get deep. Sleds run down the short slope by the school. Trucks plow the roads before school starts.

The town needs the snow. It is not just for sledding. All that snow is water. It is water that is waiting.

In spring the days get warmer. The snow on North Hill melts. The melt water runs downhill in little streams. The streams run into Birch Pond at the bottom.

Birch Pond is where the town gets its drinking water. A pump house sits at the edge of the pond. A worker named Sylvie runs the pump house. She checks the pond level every week and writes it in a book. Pipes carry the clean water to homes and to the school.

Some winters bring less snow. Then the melt water is small. By August, Birch Pond is low. The town asks people to water gardens less and to skip washing cars. Everyone waits for the next winter.

Sylvie says the town drinks last winter's snow all summer long.

Questions

  1. Where does the snow pile up above the town?
  2. Who runs the pump house at Birch Pond?
  3. What happens to the snow on North Hill in spring?
  4. Where does the melt water go when it runs downhill?
  5. What does the town ask people to do when the pond is low in August?
  6. What does Sylvie mean when she says the town drinks last winter's snow?

From Water for Schools (waterforschools.org). This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely.

Answer Key
  1. Answer: On North Hill.
    The passage says snow falls for weeks and piles up on North Hill above the town.
  2. Answer: Sylvie.
    The passage names a worker called Sylvie who runs the pump house and checks the pond level each week.
  3. Answer: It melts.
    Spring days get warmer, the snow melts, and the melt water runs downhill in little streams.
  4. Answer: Into Birch Pond.
    The little streams run down the hill and into Birch Pond at the bottom, which is the town's drinking water.
  5. Answer: Water gardens less and skip washing cars.
    Accept either action. Both are named in the passage as what the town asks after a winter with little snow.
  6. Answer: The snow that fell in winter becomes the water they drink in summer.
    The snow melts in spring, fills the pond, and the pump house sends that same water to homes through the summer.

Differentiation

Support

Read the passage in two halves, stopping after the paragraph about the melt water, and have these students retell the four steps with their hands: falling, piling, melting, filling. Give them a four-box picture strip to point at while they answer.

Extension

Ask these students to write two sentences predicting what Sylvie would write in her book after a winter with heavy snow, and what she would write after a winter with little snow. They can also explain why she checks the pond every week instead of once a year.

ELL supports

Pre-teach snowdrift, melt, and pond with an ice cube in a saucer left out during the lesson, so the melting is visible by the time students answer question 3. Post the frames "In winter the snow ___." and "In spring the snow ___." Accept short phrases for questions 1 through 4.

Extensions

Have the class keep its own weekly weather and water chart for a month, marking rain, snow, or dry days beside a line for how full a jar of collected water is. Comparing the chart to Sylvie's book gives students a reason to keep records the way a real pump house worker does.